After nearly ten years of working for firms such as De Dietrich, Mathis and Deutz, Ettore Bugatti established himself in his own premises at Molsheim, near Strasbourg. He started with the ohc four-cylinder Type 13 of 1327cc. One of his early successes was the "Bebe", made by Peugeot to Bugatti's design. Pre-war, he also built fours of 1368cc and 5027cc, first with 8, later with 16, valves. In 1913 there was a 2906cc straight-eight.

In 1922 came the first production eight-cylinder 1990cc Type 30. It was in 1924 that Ettore presented the archetypal Bugatti, the eight-cylinder Type 35 of 1990cc, subsequently developed into versions such as the 35A (1990cc) and the 35B (2261cc) or the 39A (1492cc): all were supercharged. To meet popular demand, Bugatti also evolved sports models with a 1496cc four-cylinder engine. The four-cylinder Type 40 and eight-cylinder Type 43 were also good sports cars.

The Type 55 was a fantastic 2.3 litre dohc sports car. From 1934 up to the war, Bugatti made the Type 57 of 3257cc, also available in supercharged form as the 57S and 57SC. It was the last of the production cars made by "le Patron", who died in 1947. Some Type 101 models were built post-war, but Hispano-Suiza took over the Molsheim factory to make aircraft components.

Bugatti is currently owned by VW Audi Group and are responsible for developing and building the 1,001 bhp Veyron.